Ditchbank Diaries

When poet Shirley Blackwell set out on daily walks along the bordos, or footpaths, bordering the acequias (irrigation ditches) of New Mexico's high desert, she discovered herself in a parallel universe where cultures, ecosystems, a code of conduct supporting human survival, and centuries-old folklore were tied directly to acequia community. In Ditchbank Diaries, an experimental mingling of prose and poetry she calls haibuñera, Blackwell invites us to walk with her and the thousands before her, ancient puebloans of Chaco Canyon, Spanish colonists of the 16th Century, even the Conservancy ditch rider who patrols her daily route, to explore this largely unknown cultural heritage that defines both geological and spiritual landscape in the Land of Enchantment. In these pages we meet the inhabitants, wild, domesticated, human, and mythological, who create the acequia's "collective imaginary," that sense of place, tradition, sacredness, enchantment, linked to the villages dotting New Mexico's uplands and canyons. There, acequias sustain a precious way of life. However, as Blackwell reveals how the ditchbank walks have transformed her own life, we see that acequias are vital to all of us.